Sunday, 19 May 2013

Dancing queen

A birthday card for someone who has always been a clubber at heart, and still loves dancing and sparkles even now that she has a half-grown family.

I was sent this little kit by a friend in the US, the challenge being to create at least 1 LO and 1 card using only the contents of the package, card-stock, ink, stamps and alphas as needed. The papers were all 6"x6" and there was a lovely assortment of embellishments as well. Everything was new to me, and I had such fun playing with it!


Charisma Cardz: no digis (the stamp is Whiff of Joy)
Cute Card Thursday: dancing queen
Simon Says Stamp: flower power

Oh and here is the LO I created with the same kit. I used my Spellbinders hexagons dies and a Basic Grey stitching stamp. Isn't my cousin's kiddie adorable!


Friday, 10 May 2013

Siamese if you please

Our friend has a beautiful black Siamese cat. He has always been one of those animals that sits on the window sill looking glossy and perfect like a china ornament. Then you ring the doorbell - and he jumps out of his skin, falls backwards off the window sill and instantly turns into an inelegant tangle of legs and tail as he scrabbles for a claw-hold on the laminate floor. Every single time. Why is it that a cat losing its dignity is one of the funniest things to watch? LOL

This Siamese puddy tat has most definitely not lost its dignity, and is perfect for our friend's birthday next week.

 
CASology: hexagons
CAS-ual Fridays: tic-tac-toe - polka dots, square card, birthday - happy birthday by the way!!
Cute Card Thursday: blue
Pixie's Crafty Workshop: snippets

Thursday, 9 May 2013

1

A couple of weeks ago we met our newest little cousin for the first time. What a sunny little girl! She was up early after a disturbed night, refused her nap because there was so much going on, mummy forgot her snacks in all the excitement, and bless her baby socks, there wasn't a grizzle out of her all day. If the small face crumpled and went pink for any reason, she only needed someone to give her a big smile - and she forgot to cry and smiled back. I know my experience of young children is limited, but I've never seen anything like her.

She will be 1 on Sunday, and she deserved a special card.


If mummy happens to log on and see this before the card arrives, then please keep it from her till Sunday!

Basic Grey: mix'n'match (Green at Heart and Ruby Lemonade)
Creative Card Crew: bling (it doesn't show up very well, but the 1 and the blue balloon are glitter card-stock)
Simon Says Stamp: things with wings (the butterflies obviously)
Stampin' for the Weekend: die-cuts/punches (the punched butterflies and balloons, and the other butterflies are stamped)
Sketch Saturday: I rotated the sketch

Wednesday, 1 May 2013

Happy squirrel birthday to me!

Look what Karen from ScrapJazz found for me today! How cool, and how "me" is this!



Wednesday, 24 April 2013

patriotic cupcakes please

This card is for my mother-in-law, whose birthday is on May 1st - the same as mine actually, but thankfully this has never caused problems!

And how's this for making my day? I always listen to Classic FM while I'm scrapping or card-making, and I just sent a text to Jamie Crick asking for any of Vaughan Williams' folk music, and here I am writing this post, and what is playing? His Folk Dance Suite! I have no idea whether it is in response to my text or whether I'm just psychic, but that's what they're playing. Hehee! 


It is for these challenges:
Charisma Cardz: the colour of your country's flag which is, of course, red, white and blue
Creative Card Crew (2nd entry): handmade flowers
Cute Card Thursday: cakewalk
Pixie's Crafty Snippets Playground: more snippets, and thanks for the heads-up about the extra entries! Mwah!

Tuesday, 23 April 2013

April showers bring forth...

We have flowers in the garden already; a pink flowering redcurrant, yellow forsythia, daffodils, blue anemone blanda, the primroses are all over the lawn like little patches of lost sunshine, and as for our magnolia tree... it is simply stunning. It is so very white that at night the street light reflected off it actually lights up our dining room.

This time of year is delightful with the little birds flitting around, all busy and singing. We have at least two pairs of black-caps nesting in the hedge, and one pair of long-tailed tits, and umpteen blue-tits and great-tits, as well as robins, wrens, blackbirds, dunnocks, chaffinches, siskins, goldfinches, pigeons (of course) and the ever-present noisy pheasants. We have Mr and Mrs Pheasant, as well as two distinctive male pretenders; one very pale slender one that we call the juvenile, and one adult male with half his tail feathers missing, bless him. These make constant attempts on Mrs Pheasant's delicacy, and have to be chased off by hubby. He is very glamorous and proud, she has the grace of an agitated chicken, and always makes us laugh.

Here is Mr Pheasant. He just popped through the hedge one day last week and came face to face with Mrs Deer. They had a brief, slightly startled face-off, then each decided that the other was no threat, and he walked round her to hoover up the bird-seed under our feeder, and she went back to pruning our shrubbery. How lucky am I?


Anyway, on to today's crafty stuff. This is a card that I made from using up bits from my scraps file. Even the vase is a cut-down oval die, and the greeting is made from a label die but cut using the two opposite ends without the middle. If you see what I mean.


I'm entering it into these challenges:
Creative Card Crew: handmade flowers
Simon Says Stamp: April showers bring spring flowers
Pixie's Crafty Snippets Playground: snippets (and the BEST prize this week, I would LOVE to win this!)

Friday, 19 April 2013

Clean and simple owls

I like owls. We have a lot of tawny owls living in the woods behind the house. We can hear them calling to each other in the evenings, and bat-eared DH has identified 15-20 different birds. We've seen them flying past the window in the fading light - it's such a satisfying feelings knowing that they are so close.

It was DH who bought me the Basic Grey owlets mini stamp set, and also the stitchery one, and I have to admit there are some stamps in the set that I hadn't used until today. Look how beautifully they have all come together though!




These are for the following challenges:
CASology: Word
CASual Fridays: birthday (it's mine in two weeks too :-> )
Basic Grey: Clean and simple
Less Is More: One Layer Card and a film - I'm going with Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole

I don't know whether I'm going to be able to give these away.... haha!